News Desk
GENEVA: In a sobering revelation, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced that a staggering 8.2 million new tuberculosis (TB) cases were diagnosed worldwide in the past year, marking the highest figures since the WHO began monitoring the disease in 1995. This alarming statistic comes as part of the WHO’s Global Tuberculosis Report 2024, released recently, which indicates a complex landscape in the global fight against TB.
Despite a decrease in TB-related deaths from 1.32 million in 2022 to 1.25 million in 2023, the overall number of individuals contracting the disease rose sharply from 7.5 million to 8.2 million. Yet, the reality may be even grimmer, as WHO estimates suggest that around 10.8 million people actually contracted the disease last year, highlighting a significant gap in diagnosis. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus expressed outrage over the continued impact of TB, emphasizing that the tools for prevention, detection, and treatment exist, yet the disease continues to inflict suffering.
WHO DG urged nations to fulfill their commitments to expand the use of these vital resources and to put an end to TB. The report attributes the increase in cases partly to global population growth, noting that the TB incidence rate stood at 134 new cases per 100,000 people—a slight uptick of 0.2 percent compared to the previous year. The disease’s burden is disproportionately concentrated in 30 high-burden countries, with India, Indonesia, China, the Philippines, and Pakistan accounting for over half of the global TB cases. India alone bears more than a quarter of this burden.
